Mom's B-day Weekend

My mom's birthday weekend was a blast. We left on Friday for the seven hour drive. Yep, seven hours of riding in the car. Normally we fly, but this time there was stuff to take for the party and my son was going with us, so it made sense to drive. Remind me to check that made sense next time. :)





Friday night started the weekend with a small group of family, around 26 of us, at my sister's home. Drinks, appetizers, and dinner, were prepared and served by a chef who came to her house. How cool is that. They even did the clean up afterwards.



Saturday morning, Science Guy and I met my daughter and son-in-law for breakfast and to watch the waves. Although Ike was down by Texas, the storm surge still churned on the beach in Destin. I tried to capture the waves and how high they were, but this doesn't really do it justice. The Whales Tail is right on the beach and it's one of my favorite places to go have breakfast when we visit my family. Shortly after that there was a lunch and drinks at the beach club. SG and I didn't do that one. We drove around and looked at the water, did a little shopping, and then worked on the wish bowl for Saturday night.



So far it had been a great and busy weekend, seeing family I haven't' seen in years and in general enjoying the town. Then Saturday night rolls around. We're dressed and ready to go. Downstairs I see some of the family staying at the hotel. They asked if we want to follow them, but no, we're not quite ready to go yet. I had to get something from the car and take it back upstairs before we could leave.

What should have taken us all of twenty minutes to find the place, ended up taking over an hour. It's not like I don't know Destin, but when I asked for directions, well...let's just say they weren't exactly correct.

The first hour, the one that we missed, was where the staff walked around with drinks and appetizers for everyone while they mingled. So it wasn't to bad. Of course SG and I ordered drinks as soon as we arrived. After the hour of driving up and down Hwy 98, the margarita was a welcoming calm to the frazzled nerves.









Dinner was yummy and my sister had these hilarious sunglasses for everyone to wear. Afterwards we danced and danced, okay and danced some more.



Sunday morning was relaxing outside on the balcony overlooking the bay and then packing it all up to head home. After a stop at my mom's to pick up my son and short visit, we loaded my son's stuff in the car and hit the road to make the drive home.

Remember the seven hour drive? Yeah, well not so much on the way home. I was driving, we were all talking and I took a wrong exit. We hadn't paid attention on the way up and didn't realize there were two exits for this small town that would take us back to 19. We're driving and the road is beautiful. The hills were a welcomed sight for about ten minutes. That's when I realized we were not on the right road. I know what you're thinking, turn around and go back. Not so easy since there wasn't a place to turn around and on each side of the road was rather swampy. Finally we found a place, turned around, and headed back to the interstate. The seven hour drive turned into ten. Again, that's why I fly.

All in all the weekend was wonderful. Yes, the drive was long, but seeing family and friends was great and the my mom had the best time, being the queen for the weekend. Okay, so she's always the queen in our family, but this was an extra special queen time for her.

How about you? Do you drive for vacations?

WW's and PD's, Vicki